Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested . . . . – Sir Francis Bacon“Of Studies”

I find television very educating. Every time somebody turns on the set, I go into the other room and read a book. – Groucho Marx

It is what you read when you don’t have to that determines what you will be when you can’t help it.– Oscar Wilde

LAUGHTER

When we laugh, a sort of temporary anesthesia is released within us that blocks the pain as our attention is diverted.–Chuck Swindoll in Five Meaningful Minutes a Day

I love people who make me laugh. I honestly think it’s the thing I like most, to laugh. It cures a multitude of ills. It’s probably the most important thing in a person. – Audrey Hepburn

CHINA

Friendship is delicate as [china], once broken it can be fixed but there will always be cracks.– Waqar Ahmed

It’s a wise husband who will buy his wife such fine china that she won’t trust him to wash the dishes.– Honoré de Balzac

I’ll love you, dear, I’ll love you till China and Africa meet and the river jumps over the mountain and salmon sing in the street. – W. H. Auden

We have a week and a half left of work and we are like delicate china speeding toward a brick wall. Sounds fun, huh? – Jennifer Anniston

Start living now. Stop saving the good china for that special occasion. Stop withholding your love until that special person materializes. Every day you are alive is a special occasion. Every minute, every breath, is a gift from God.

Do not abandon yourselves to despair. We are the Easter people and hallelujah is our song. ― Pope John Paul II

LAUGHTER

Laughter is the shock absorber that eases the blows of life. (Unknown)

Laughter is a tranquilizer with no side effects. ― Arnold H. Glasgow

WORK

Nothing is really work unless you would rather be doing something else. ― J. M. Barrie

When you can’t figure out what to do, it’s time for a nap. ― Mason Cooley

CHALLENGE

Challenge is a dragon with a gift in its mouth.

Tame the dragon and the gift is yours.

Noela Evans, on persevering through problems, endurance

Shakespeare says it another way, but with a toad: Sweet are the uses of adversity which, like the toad, ugly and venomous, wears yet a precious jewel in his head.

READING

Reading gives us someplace to go when we have to stay where we are. ― Mason Cooley

One rainy Sunday when I was in the third grade, I picked up a book to look at the pictures and discovered that even though I did not want to, I was reading. I have been a reader ever since. ― Beverly Cleary

THE FUTURE

The best thing about the future is it comes one day at a time. ― Abraham Lincoln

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Do you believe a challenge is a dragon with a gift in its mouth? A story about this that comes to mind . . . ?

What category can you add a quote to?

What other topics would you like to see in this monthly feature, Purple Passages?